The Harman Kardon Invoke is a new player in the smart speaker game. If you make a purchase by clicking one of our links, we may earn a small share of the revenue. Our picks and opinions are independent from any business incentives. Smart speakers like the Amazon Echo and Google Home have exploded in popularity this past year, but a new competitor has entered the scene. Made by Harman Kardon and powered by Microsoft's smart assistant--known as Cortana--the Invoke was officially announced today after being teased back in December.

Watch out Alexa, there is a new digital assistant in town. Microsoft and Harman Kardon, a subsidiary of Samsung Electronics, are set to release a smart speaker this fall that plays music, manages calendars, checks traffic and more – and it is powered by Cortana. Called Invoke, the device uses Cortana's natural language recognition and deep integration, combined with Microsoft's suite of knowledge and productivity tools in a bid to take on Amazon's Alexa. Invoke is outfitted with Harman's SONIQUE far-field voice recognition technology. And it is a proprietary 360-degree adaptive technology (featuring 7 microphones) that recognizes all details of voice commands even in environments with high ambient noise.

If the future of computing really does look like Her, and everyone will soon be talking to their devices and falling in love with the soothing voices in our ear, Microsoft is sitting pretty. Or at least, it ought to be: Its Cortana virtual assistant already integrates seamlessly into Windows 10, works on iOS and Android, and will start showing up in cars soon. It's good for work, good for play, even has a cool name. Yet Cortana gets left out of the voice assistant in-crowd, because it's missing one key thing: a smart speaker like the Google Home or Amazon Echo. Those in-home devices have become the first place most people use these assistants, and Microsoft just doesn't have one.

Amid reports that Amazon controls 70-plus percent of the voice-controlled smart speaker market with its Echo devices, a new product from Harman Kardon offers the Microsoft Cortana AI, and there are rumors that Apple is working on a Siri-enabled device. It wasn't that long ago that this niche device didn't even exist, and when Amazon first introduced the Echo there was some cynicism about whether anyone would even want such a device. I mean, most people already have a smartphone--which means they already have access to voice-assisted AI through Siri, Cortana, OK Google, or some other means. The question was whether or not anyone would even be interested in a standalone device that pretty much just listens to everything you say so you can interact with it. Apparently, the answer was, "Yes."

Amazon.com Inc is dominating the nascent market for voice-controlled speakers, research firm eMarketer has revealed in a new study. The e-commerce giant's Amazon Echo and Echo Dot devices will claim a 70.6 percent share of the U.S. market this year. The speakers feature Alexa, Amazon's voice-controlled aide, which users can tell to play music, order an Uber or turn on the house lights. Inc is dominating the nascent market for voice-controlled speakers, research firm eMarketer has revealed in a new study. The e-commerce giant's Amazon Echo and Echo Dot devices will claim a 70.6 percent share of the U.S. market this year Amazon Echo and Echo Dot devices are expected to claim a 70.6 percent share of the U.S. market this year.

You can use Google's Home to cast Spotify (and other streaming music services) to your sound system with Chromecast using voice commands. The instructions for how to do this provided by both Google and Spotify assume you have either a Chromecast-equipped TV or Chromecast Audio. You can use the base Chromecast to cast both audio and video. Here's how to do it. If it's a new Chromecast, set it up using the Google Home app on a mobile device or laptop.

Google Home has picked some cool high-profile features over the past few weeks, including support for multiple accounts and access to millions of recipes, but a new feature that has flown in under the radar might be even more useful. Instead of paying top dollar on a bulky white noise machine for you or your newborn baby, your Google Home can now fill your room with soothing ambient sounds. There are 15 in all, ranging from a crackling fireplace to a babbling brook. And since they'll most often be used when you're already tired and stressed out, Google has made it super easy to operate. If you say, "OK Google, help me relax," your Google Home will play a random ambient noise for the next hour (or until you tell it to stop).

When I give talks on data strategy and AI strategy, I talk about data being the new oil. And, data being the fuel (oil) that is fueling the AI machine. I also talk about how to value data, since it is perhaps the most valuable modern business asset, yet is not yet accurately accounted for. Check out the slide below that I present as part of my 40 minute talk. It compares the largest companies (by market cap) from 2006 vs. 20016.

Artificial Intelligence must be the most overused word these days! You will be hard put to find any edition of a newspaper on any day, which does not have at least one reference to AI. Yet interestingly, this is the Second Coming of the technology that is vaguely defined as human-like intelligence displayed by machines and was first mooted in the US at a conference in 1956. Computers were soon winning at checkers, solving word problems in algebra, proving logical theorems and speaking English. The originators of the AI idea including its Bhishma Pitamaha, Marvin Minsky, claimed that Machines would be capable, within twenty years, of doing any work a Man can do.

Alexa is absolutely crushing the smart assistant competition. Amazon's line of AI voice-controlled Echo speakers gobbled up a massive 70.7 percent of the marketshare in the first forecast on digital assistant usage by business research firm eMarketer. Alexa-enabled devices lapped the next closest competitor, Google, by nearly 50 percent of the marketshare, as just 23.8 percent of users reported they'll use the Home speaker. "Others," which include offerings from Lenovo, LG, Harmon Kardon, and Mattel, hold just 5.6 percent of users. The forecast reports 35.6 million Americans said they'll use a voice-activated assistant device -- defined as a "standalone device whose core functionality is a voice-enabled digital assistant" -- at least once a month this year.